Tools:

• Ubiquity 300Mw Cardbus Express
• Freedom Keychain GPS
• Backtrack 3 live cd
• kismetearth
• Bluetooth Dongle
• Laptop

These are the tools I used, I bought most of them from ebay, and I know them to work extremely well. However, there are alot of other configurations that will also work equally well. Many laptops’ internal wireless card will suffice, I use the ubiquity card because it has off-the-shelf support in 99% of linux distros and has a high sensitivity. your mileage may vary.

Chances are, if your wireless card is detected and supported in Backtrack, your good to go.

The gps I picked is extremely useful, its small and very easy to use, but you can use any number of other gps devices. I wont attempt to suggest how to begin using every gps device, you’ll have to figure that out yourself.

Introduction:

Wardriving is the wifi equivilent of chartography. There are many other names, warwalking, warcycling, war-whatever, with the exception of warchalking which is often illegal due to the use of chalk on private property. Wikipedia defines wardriving as:

Wardriving is the act of searching for Wi-Fi wireless networks by a person in a moving vehicle, using a portable computer or PDA.

One might reasonably ask why you would go out of your way to search, then log, the wireless networks in a given area. There are many reasons actually, more than I care to list, but heres a couple:

• Purely for the fun and joy of it
• To know where open and/or free access points are located, and where they are and/or are not accessible from (ie: deadzones)
• When creating a wireless network, it is often necessary to know the operating frequency, strength and/or location of other networks in the area so that signals do not interfere with each other and cause degraded performance. wardriving is very effective in this area.
• Statistical research on wireless security and the like

Naturally with anything not so well understood, often it may come to pass that people will claim this activity is illegal, in any case. I am no lawyer and make no claims that what I say here is to be considered legal council, saying that however… when you understand the technology its hard to make that argument stick.

The Basics:

Wireless access points, as part of their very function, broadcast information about themselves such that you know their name (ssid), channel (frequency) and encryption requirements (does it require a password?). This is no more than a house having its address printed outside; and detailing this information - at least in my view, is nothing more than capturing public information - willingly given by the owners. Bear in mind after all, access points can almost always be told to be in an ‘isolation’ mode where it does not broadcast these details if it so wishes. So its a choice to make this information available to the public.

In the next article I will discuss how to connect your gps, configure kismet, and get started wardriving.